Summer Projects: Code of Law; Stamps, Money, and Passports; Research on Lycurgus

Sing, Demeter, that we may learn these skills as you taught in Eleusis.

The Central People’s Government has enjoyed a break following the fourth anniversary of the Creation of the Sandum Nation on XXVI Maio MMXIII (26 May 2013) and will resume business shortly before the departure of the Sôgmô and the Royal Family for Iceland and France on II Iunio (2 June). We have considered several projects for which Sandus will dedicate itself to over the next month of June.

Before leaving for Iceland, the Sôgmô shall publish his findings on the topic of Sancta naming conventions. These naming conventions will be used in the future to provide citizens an alternative, more private name in the realm of Sandus. Naming conventions will also be gender-neutral based upon inheritance and will consist of a praenomen (prename), nomen (name), cognomen (nickname), and agnomen (awarded name). Full Sancta names will be long, as cognomina (nicknames) will consist of several descriptors and characteristics so as to provide options and individuality to each citizen. Names will be able to be registered and changed via the quarterly censuses. Once more, a full report shall be published through Sacerdotium by the Sôgmô before II Iunio (2 June).

The Sôgmô and the Überstadti King Adam I have discussed joining together both nations in authoring a code of law. Upon the concern of the Sôgmô, the King of Überstadt noted the close philosophical relation to the Sandum Philosophy. The Sôgmô hopes to research Roman, Justinian, and Napoleonic Codes of Law before the end of Quintilo (July). The beginning of this project would mark the first consideration of a legal and judicial system in Sandus, a state that has insofar been void of such a system. It is likely that two drafts would be made for both nations, but the same research and consideration would be joined together into one. When the Überstadi King suggested to derive it from another code of law, the Sôgmô promptly noted that the code of law would be drafted like all other products of the Sandum nation-state: they would be created based upon educated research and taking keen consideration on the aspects of many others in order to create an independent function.

The Office of the Sôgmô has received, and signed, a treaty of mutual recognition with the Francophone Republic of Padrhom. The Sôgmô signed both copies of the treaty and is due to return one copy of the treaty to General Person in Charge Michel Vichat of the Republic on XXIX Maio (29 May). The text of the treaty is in Sandus’s two official languages of French and English.
Having attention caught by the Padrhomien stamp, the Sôgmô will follow the advice and the directions of the GPIC in developing Sandum stamps. Though noted by the GPIC to be typically of lesser quality than those of nations who purchase industrially-made stamps, the GPIC aptly noted that the industry was local and independent: a cause which resonates with Sandus’s Libera and Realism. The objective of printing Sandum stamps is of an overall Philia cause for national improvement and of the creation and strengthening of the sense of nationalism in the Sandum nation. The printing of stamps shall coincide with the objectives of printing money and passports, and instituting a formal treasury for the printing of persumae. It is doubted that a Sandum postal service will be created, as many other nation-projects have done, out of a lack of necessity that would prompt the creation of such an organ; instead, the stamps will be a simple objective of the Central People’s Government in the strengthening of the Sandum identity.
Money and passports shall be printed later on, with the guidance and aid of foreign craftspersons.

Research on the famous historical law-giver Lycurgus of Sparta shall coincide with the code of law project, but shall be enacted independently. The Sôgmô shall work to present a paper to citizens on Sacerdotium, the newspaper of the Collegio Sacerdae, and will present a lecture on the subject in late Quintilo (July) or in early-to-mid Sextilo (August) to the Scholastica Antiqua academic group in ROMA on Second Life. The Sôgmô is planning to refute the belief of Sparta being only a militaristic state and will work to spurn misconceptions of the Spartan state and constitution in order to present Sparta as an ideal model which can inspire Sandus. Research on this topic will be used with Plutarch’s “The Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans” as well as “On Sparta”.

When the Royal Family departs for France, connections will still be able to be maintained, although Sandum government shall operate at a slower pace.